


Mars Ascending

by kore_rising



Series: Celestial Bodies [2]
Category: Inception (2010)
Genre: F/M
Language: English
Status: Completed
Published: 2010-11-06
Updated: 2010-11-06
Packaged: 2017-10-14 11:01:30
Rating: Explicit
Warnings: No Archive Warnings Apply
Chapters: 1
Words: 7,063
Publisher: archiveofourown.org
Story URL: https://archiveofourown.org/works/148571
Author URL: https://archiveofourown.org/users/kore_rising/pseuds/kore_rising
Summary: <blockquote class="userstuff">
              <p>"In the immortal words of The Darkness: Get your hands off my woman, motherf**ker."</p>
            </blockquote>





	Mars Ascending

**Author's Note:**

> Rating: NC-17 for sex, swearing, guns and hair metal.  
> Pairing: Ariadne/Arthur  
> Notes/Warnings: For [this](http://community.livejournal.com/inception_kink/11005.html?thread=22988285#t22988285) prompt at[](http://community.livejournal.com/inception_kink/profile)[ **inception_kink**](http://community.livejournal.com/inception_kink/): "In the immortal words of The Darkness: Get your hands off my woman, motherf**ker."
> 
> The characters, setting and story of Inception are the property of Christopher Nolan and no cash is being made from this story.
> 
> This is a sequel of sorts to [_Paraselene_](http://kore-rising.livejournal.com/5003.html), but reading that is not essential to enjoying this.  
> 

~*~  
 _  
You are drunk and you are surly  
In Latino lover mode  
We all know what's on your agenda  
We've broken the code_

 _Oh I've got no right to lay claim to her frame  
She's not my possession  
You c*nt._

 _Get your hands off my woman motherfucker_  
.

\---

Looking back, I'm not entirely sure who was to blame. Cobb, perhaps, for insisting we woo our new client with any means necessary? Eames, for suggesting the club and plying the man with drinks? Or even me, for not being as restrained as I might otherwise have been under any other circumstances?

Of one thing I am certain though: There's now one asshole will think twice the next time he decides that he's God's Gift to Women.

\---

Things started pretty much as any new client meeting tended to. As in quiet dinner in the kind of restaurant where the menus don't print prices next to the dishes and if you have to ask you obviously can't afford it; a little chat about how what was required, what we could do, how we could do it, all the various and sundry minutiae that went into winning over the prospective customer.

Eames, Ariadne and I had all sat in a neat little row drinking mineral water, eating arugula and angel hair pasta and talking nineteen to the dozen. Perhaps then was when I should have noticed that our latest catch was paying far too much attention to my architect, regardless of the fact she was flanked by two serious and dangerous (even if I do say so myself) men or that on her left hand was a tastefully chosen and very visible diamond engagement ring.

The guy was one of those new media, information tech types who wore glasses he didn't need (I knew he'd had laser vision correction years before), snorted when he laughed and probably sucked at gym class in school because he spent all day sitting on his ass in front of his Apple Mac wearing a pocket protector while getting an indoor tan. Now, of course, he was personally trained into sleek muscularity, had a two hundred dollar hair cut and his sweater vests came courtesy of Paul Smith rather than Casual Corner. His name, although I would rather rinse my brain out with bleach than recall it, was Justin Folds. Or, as he preferred, _"Justin Folds, re-inventor of social networking and the digital medium."_   Perhaps I would have liked him better had he not repeated this little spiel after shaking hands with each one of us.

Or if in Ariadne's case he hadn't taken her hand and planted a wet kiss on the back of it.

Eames had caught my eye right as Folds was smacking his lips on her skin, and I knew from his reaction that my face must have been a shock, even for the laid back forger to see; _"Eyes like paper cuts, a mouth so sour it could curdle milk and  eyebrows knotted like shoelaces_ , Eames had remarked later, _I thought you were going to knock his block off then and there_." But to give him credit, he had kept any smart remarks to himself and interposed his own hand over Fold's friendly gesture, smiling like a Cheshire cat and saying "What, no kiss for me?" While Ariadne made a moue of disgust and wiped her hand discreetly on a tissue. She took my hand under the table as we sat down and placed it firmly on her knee, doubtless trying to reassure me that she had no interest in him whatsoever or his feeble attempts at flirting.

And they were feeble. He even tried a few pick up lines, for fuck's sake. That old hackneyed one about her father being a thief, which no matter how you do it always makes you sound like a dick ("Hey, was your father a thief?" "What the fuck, asshole? That's my father you're talking about!") To give Ariadne all credit, she simply laughed it off politely as if he was making the funniest joke since humour was invented by that road crossing chicken but it made me grab her leg so hard I swear I would have left a bruise if I'd have held on any longer. She changed the subject, kept him on track for a few minutes, then he tried some godawful schtick about how her legs must be tired because she'd certainly been running through his dreams all night, making her snap sharply that it was unlikely since we'd only just met. Which deterred him for a little longer, but didn't manage to quell him entirely because lord help me, when he was two thirds of the way down the bottle of the very expensive Mouton Rothschild he'd ordered, he licked his finger, touched her sleeve and snorted "Let's get you out of those wet things, eh?"

Luckily his own hilarity at the joke covered up the fact we were all sitting facing him like a line of statues with almost identical expressions of disbelief, horror and, in my case, anger. Ariadne instantly jerked her arms off the table as if it was on fire, tremors of suppressed tension coming off her in waves. I was busy wondering if stabbing him with my butter knife would count as assault with a deadly weapon and having to physically work to unclench my jaw from the rictus it locked itself into. Even Eames, a man who can tell jokes so blue they should carry a parental advisory sticker, was looking at him like he'd just stripped naked, jumped on the table, started waving his cock about like a finger puppet while making it talk in a silly voice and singing _I've Got A Little Something For You._ __

__We had reached the dessert course (sorbet for us, some tarte or other for him) and I was looking forward to getting the hell away from him and his roving eyes, crappy jokes and appalling social graces when, like a child discovering holding his breath will make his parents do whatever he wants, Folds announced in the loudest voice possible he wanted to _"go somewhere with a bit more life for a nightcap."_ Never mind he was in one of the best restaurants in Paris, drinking fine wine out of Baccarat crystal stem ware and spilling his three star Michelin food over a damask table cloth, oh no.

I was all for throwing my napkin on the table, taking Ariadne's hand and just walking out when Cobb's last instructions came back to me: "Woo him however you need to." Not that work had been thin on the ground for us recently, but a well paying client meant more time out of usual semi legal environment and would see us all clear to take a vacation, something we were desperately in need of after an almost non stop year of mind crime. So I could see his point, even though at the time I thought it meant just tolerating some braying ass for a little while longer.

So I turned to Eames, the professional sheen on my stuck on grin trying not to crack, and asked if he knew anywhere. And by anywhere, I meant somewhere close to our apartments and relatively discreet since with the amount of alcohol slopping around Folds' system he was likely to yell something revealing at precisely the wrong moment and I had no desire for the good people of Paris to decide it was time to call the _gendarmes_ on us _._ Eames made a face. I realised he must have been hoping I'd put my foot down since I knew he was meeting Ellie later. But he rallied, beamed like Folds was his newest, bestest pal in the whole wide world and suggested a little place that he would just love.

~*~

 _  
Octoped, you've got six hands too many,  
And you can't keep them to yourself  
You're too fat and too old to marry  
So they left you on the shelf  
_

 _Oh I've got no right to lay claim to her frame  
But you soiled my obsession  
You c*nt._

 _Get your hands off my woman motherfucker_

\---

Eames must have used our taxi ride to the basement bar to send Ellie a message, since when we arrived she was waiting at a corner table in the dimly lit room with five chairs neatly arranged around it and a bottle of whisky set dead in the centre next to a bucket of ice and five glasses. It took both Eames and I to get Folds across the floor without staggering and to drop him into a chair alongside Ellie, who favoured him with a charming smile as he struggled to focus on her face. "Ah, another beautiful woman!" He grabbed her hand and repeated his lip smacking routine on her, while next to me Eames bristled like a porcupine. "I want to be the thorn between two roses!" He turned, grabbed Ariadne by the wrist and pulled her into the chair next to him so hard she didn't so much sit as fall. "You know you've arrived, don't you, when you're the man surrounded by beauties like these, hey guys?" He threw an arm around the backs of Ariadne's and Ellie's chairs while giving us a huge shit eating grin.

I was on the verge of reminding him, rather forcefully, that neither woman was there because he was charming, intelligent or even particularly talented when Eames pulled out my chair, inching it deliberately close to Ariadne's, and pushed me into it with a firm hand. As soon as I was seated I slipped one discreet hand around her hip, she leant into me almost reflexively and I could feel the tight lines of her back and shoulders. Folds' was making eyes at Ellie's cleavage, so I took advantage of his distraction to press a cautious kiss on Ariadne's temple, hoping to smooth out the faintly pained look she now had marring her face. She closed her eyes briefly and let out a long, quiet sigh when my lips met her skin, making me realise that for as much as I wanted this night over she probably wanted it twice as much.

Eames nodded to Ellie, who by now looked like she wanted to dump the contents of ice bucket in Folds' lap then crown him with the empty vessel. But showing remarkable restraint, instead she reached out and started to pour him a generous shot of whiskey. Eames took advantage of him fixating on his drink to unpeel his arms from the women's chairs and prop him on the table instead, with a sharply jocular "You'll need one hand to drink with, old man." But I noticed that when he took his seat he was practically in Ellie's lap and slung a territorial arm around her shoulders for good measure.

"A toast!" Folds practically yodelled when he had his glass. "To youth, beauty, " he leered at Ariadne and Ellie who recoiled, "and making a lot of money!" This was directed at Eames and I, making Eames' mouth twist slightly in repulsion and setting my own face in stone. I can clearly remember asking myself at this point, as we all half lifted our glasses and mumbled a response, if he could possibly get any worse, and deciding no, he would be face down in a puddle of alcohol before that happened.

\---

My mistake, if I can be said to have made one, was to go to the bathroom. On the face of it it seemed like a good moment; Folds was dancing, or rather staggering in time to, the music of the small house band while Eames and Ellie swayed neatly around the floor together, keeping an eye on him. He had taken a fancy to a rather neat looking blonde who didn't seem to mind his crude ways or the smell of drink, and she was holding his hand as he gravitated around the jive, the bunny hop and the waltz.

Ariadne was still leaning against me, her body softer and her face lacking it's previous bitter twist. "God, what a knob." She fired each word out with relish, resting her head back on my shoulder.  
"Picking up slang from Eames now?"  
"It fits him, don't you think? He's the knobbiest knob in Knobville." She smiled into her whiskey and melted ice. "King Knob the First of Knobania. Captain Knob of the first battalion..."

"I get the idea." We watched as he tried to twirl his lady friend and all but sent her into a table, making us both wince. "But I have to agree."   
"How long before we can leave, do you think?" She put her glass down heavily. "I'm tired, sick of being drooled on and I've heard enough bad lines to last me the rest of my life. I think Eames can handle him from here, don't you?" She turned her head to fix me with one of her intense, dark looks. One of the ones that  pretty much always, no matter what the circumstances, make me putty in her hands.  
   
I risked another glance at Folds, who seemed far too busy dancing to notice us. Eames caught my eye and tipped me a careful nod over Ellie's shoulder, that hopefully being his private code for _I've got this one, Arthur_.   
"Yes, I think he's more than up to it. I'll just use the men's room then we'll go, OK?"  
She smiled gratefully and kissed me gently. "OK."

\---

I will swear to this day that I was only gone for two minutes at most. One hundred and twenty seconds, give or take a couple, out of sight of Ariadne, Folds, Eames and Ellie. But apparently this was more than enough time for the situation to go from 'fine' to 'shit storm'. 

\---

The first thing I saw was that Folds was back at our table, his blonde dancing partner abandoned on the sidelines of the floor like a discarded toy. He had his back to me, but Ariadne was at such an angle that I could tell that he had one hand tight in his, the other on her ribs and his face far too close to hers. She was evidently resisting him, her free hand square on his chest to push him away while she was plainly repeating the word **_No_** ;  but he was simply ignoring her and pressing in closer, closer, until he made the biggest mistake of our short acquaintance. 

He put his tongue out and licked her face.

 _He licked Ariadne's face_.

 _'My architect!_ _**My fiancée!**_ _**My goddamn woman!'**_ My brain screeched as red mist descended like a storm cloud. He had dared to put his hands on her then to wipe his filthy mouth over her skin. My blood boiled, every muscle in my body tightened in fury and I swear I would have shot him from where I was standing had I not wanted the satisfaction of seeing the look on his face when I beat his sorry ass into the floor first.

I was across the floor so fast the room span around me. I heard Ellie gasp Eames' name, noticed him turn in slow motion then start, horror writ large on his face as he grabbed her in one hand, doubtless trying beat me to the table. But there was no way in hell I was going to allow that.

Folds' voice was clear as I rushed up behind him, my right hand closing on my gun. "Aww, baby. Don't you like me? If I work with you you're going to have to be nicer to me than this." That was it. I was going to destroy him, Cobb be damned.

Ariadne's head tilted up, away from him and in doing so she saw me. At first her face showed a mixture of relief, fury and utter disgust, but then her mouth and eyes widened into three Os as she absorbed my outraged expression, her arm shook as she forced Folds back, cannoning him into me as I reached out to grab the little shit.   

My left hand clamped down on the nerve bundle at the base of his neck so hard my knuckles turned white, ignoring his sudden yelp and wriggle of pain. The barrel of my gun slammed into the back of his head like a punch, knocking what breath he had out in a rush. I leant over him, his squirming lessening by the minute as I squeezed tighter, every fibre in me just waiting for a single word command ("Fire!", "Kill!", "Break!"). I have no idea where it came from, but I spat my next sentence into his ear, ladling every syllable with the promise of a slow, painful demise:

"In the immortal words of The Darkness: **_Get Your Hands Off My Woman, Mother Fucker_.** "

  
He froze, his hands still on her wrist and abdomen. The room was deathly quiet all of a sudden. Even the band had stopped playing. You could have heard a pin drop except for the faint whimpers of Folds as he wilted in his seat.

"Did you not hear me? _Let Go Of My Fiancée._ ** _Now_**." I jabbed my gun against him as reinforcement.

"OK, OK man. We were just having a little fun, that's all, that's all, I swear." He babbled stupidly. Fire raged in my brain; a little fun, was it? To go around grabbing at unwilling women who were saying no with every single word and gesture? I was going to administer the world's first Glock assisted castration, no question about it.

" _Let Her Go_." I clamped down so hard he slid off his chair and onto his knees by Ariadne's feet, his face going pale green, his eyes bulging and rolling in his head but his hands finally leaving her. Ariadne pushed her chair back in a screech of protesting furniture and was immediately on her feet, her hands scrubbing at her face and body before her eyes settled on the kneeling boy quaking in front of her.

"You _fucking_ piece of _shit_!" She yelled, her face white with anger. "How _fucking_ dare you?" She put her left hand out, knuckles first and for one terrible second I thought she was going to punch him in the face. "Do you see _this_?" She shoved her ring in his face. "Do you see _this_ , shit for brains?" He nodded weakly. " _Answer me_!" Her voice was hoarse with fury.

"Yes." He managed after I prodded him sharply with my gun.

"Do you know what it means? Do you know why I've got a _fucking_ ring on this _fucking_ finger of this _fucking_ hand?" He trembled in my rage frozen grip but didn't interrupt.

"It means that only one person on the face of this _fucking_ Earth is allowed to touch me like you tried to, and even he would never do so without asking my _fucking_ permission first." Folds mouth moved silently as she carried on, perhaps praying for deliverance or some avenging angel to come and whisk him away. Not on my watch they aren't, buddy.

"And do you know why it's him and only him, you jumped up, egocentric, misogynist _prick_? Do you even have a clue?" His head shook and he mumbled something like _oh god, please... "_ It has nothing to do with how much money he has, how strong he is or how _fucking_ fantastic he is in bed..."

In the background I heard Eames mutter "Arthur's good in bed? Oh please, don't let her go into details on that. My imagination can't take it." Then the faint _omph_ as Ellie smacked his arm. 

"...it has every _fucking_ thing to do with the fact that he has never, ever treated me as anything less than a intelligent, capable human _fucking_ being, not some kind of tits and ass doll for him to paw at whenever the mood takes him. Do you understand that, you repellent little scum bag? You bottom feeding, shit eating, stinking _parasite_? How dare you do that to me! How _fucking_ dare you!" Her eyes were wild and her teeth bared in a snarl.

"Apologise." I ordered, shaking him for emphasis.

"I'm sorry." He quavered faintly, looking up at Ariadne's enraged face.

"Properly." I hissed, my own anger still razor sharp.

"I'm so sorry, I didn't mean to touch you like that. Please, forgive me. I'm so sorry, so very, very sorry. Don't kill me. I should have been more respectful of you, I know that. Oh please, I won't ever do it again, I swear. Don't hurt me, please, don't let him hurt me." His voice wailed and sobbed as the unmistakable smell of urine rose from him.

"Jesus," Eames sounded disgusted, "he's wet himself, for goodness sake."

Ariadne's eyes met mine over Folds weeping, shaking form. She looked drained,  her anger banked to a flicker in her eyes and her arms wrapped around herself in a hug. I raised both my eyebrows at her and she nodded once. She was done with him, and so was I.

"Eames," I said tightly, "We're all leaving. Make sure no one saw anything before we go, is that clear?"  
He glanced around the room, and I saw the patron nod from behind the bar at Eames' gesture, the meaning plain; a few hundred Euro should see us clear, no question. "Perfectly." He replied smartly as he reached for his wallet.

I slid my gun away, then with a last, disgusted shove threw Folds to the floor where he landed in a blubbering heap. "Never try anything like that again, do you hear me?" He made a soft noise of assent. "She's spared you worse. I would have left you for dead. Be grateful I listen to the woman I love." He mumbled thanks and groped towards Ariadne's feet, making her step away sharply and me kick his legs none too gently to stop him. 

"Don't try and contact us. We have no interest in you, your business or your money." I sneered, then stepped over him and wrapped my arm around Ariadne so she was tight to my side. "Let's go." I said to her quietly, turning our backs on the human waste on the floor behind me. "Eames, are we good?" I raised my voice, bringing him bustling up from the bar with a shark toothed grin and ferociously amused blue eyes.

"Perfect, Arthur. All done and dusted. Ellie, my sweet?" He smiled charmingly as he wrapped his jacket around her bare shoulders and chivalrously offered her his arm. "Shall we?"

In a tight knot of four we swept up the stairs and into the quiet Parisian night. 

\---

Ellie hugged Ariadne goodbye outside our building. I heard her whisper softly, asking if Ariadne was OK, rubbing her back while Eames and I shuffled our feet, hands jammed into our pockets. She let go eventually, kissing both Ariadne's cheeks and saying  that she admired what she had said, Folds was a jerk off and to forget him. Her eyes met mine briefly as Eames took her back under his arm, wishing me a calm good night with a nod of her head. Eames saluted me shortly as they disappeared up the street, finally leaving us alone.

Ariadne took my hand and we went quietly up the stairs, neither of us saying a word but our grip like a vice on each others fingers. She remained admirably calm until our front door was shut, when she turned and slammed her fist into it in fury.

"How could he? How could anyone do that?" Her eyes were dark and her features bitter with disgust.

"He was drunk, you're attractive and he isn't used to people telling him no. It wasn't your fault."

She ripped off her jacket and dropped it on the floor. "I feel..." Her skirt followed, the zip tearing open, then her shoes wrenched free and thrown down with two thunks. "He made me feel..." She yanked off her blouse. "Disgusting! He made me feel like dirt!" Her pantyhose laddered as she tore them away, shaking them free of her fingers. "Why the hell didn't I stop him sooner?" Her panties landed on the pile, then she jerked off her bra. "God, he was touching me! I can't wear these things again," She kicked the pile of clothes on the floor, her hands fisting and her face screwed up, "I want to burn them."

"I'll get rid of them." Her arms felt cold when I took hold of them, the muscles tight and hard under my hands.

"God, I want a shower. I want to scrub him off me." She jerked in my grip, reaching for her hair and pulling it down. The clip joined her clothes on the floor. "I've got to get him off me." Tears of rage ran down her face and I wanted to hold her so badly my chest ached, but I didn't want to, I couldn't, smother her. I leant forward and put a kiss on her forehead. "Go and wash up. I'll get rid of this," I toed the discarded clothes at my feet, "I'll make some tea."

She slumped suddenly, like a puppet that had had it's strings cut. "Go on." I kissed her again and pushed her carefully down the hall. To my immense relief she went, her footfalls slapping on the bare wood, but I didn't dare move until I heard the rush of falling water.

Her clothes lay is a warm, perfumed heap, the scent of whiskey and her filling my senses as I gathered them up. I recognised the suit as one she'd brought just after she came to work with us full time, twirling in front of me with a smile and asking "Do I look like a real extractor now?" The underwear was the plain kind she preferred, Italian silk in deference to her improved status. And the shoes...I had brought her those and my anger flared again, making me want to hurl something through a window in rage. He'd even made my gift to her seem polluted. I stuffed everything into a trash bag, tied it in a knot and shoved it into the cupboard under the kitchen sink. Once the door was closed I exhaled in relief; at least one part of this was dealt with.

\---

Ariadne was in the shower so long I considered breaking the door down, but eventually she emerged swathed in two enormous white towels to find me sitting up in bed, half reading and drinking tea. In all honesty what I most wanted to do was go back out, find Folds and force feed him my Glock, but killing him wouldn't undo what he'd done and Ariadne would probably feel no better for knowing he was dead.

"Hi." She sat down next to me and I noticed her left cheek was red from having been scrubbed at so ferociously it had all but broken the skin. "Hi. How are you feeling?" She shrugged and sipped her tea, then put the cup down on the night stand.

"Clean." She supplied pointlessly, picking at her towel before turning to look at me. "Thank you for what you did in there."

"You're my woman." I grinned at her. This drew a small smile, much to my relief, doubtless reminding her of the first night we had ever spent together.

"You really can't go around calling me that. I'm not your possession." She replied with arched brows.

"No. If you belong to anyone it's yourself.  But I warned you once that I was greedy, didn't I? I should also have told you I absolutely will not share you with anyone." I cautiously put both arms around her and felt her relax against me. "And anyone who tries to touch you like that again will regret they ever even thought of it." She shivered slightly and put her free hand up against my face, taking in my now serious look.

"Would you have killed him?" She asked quietly.

"I wanted to." The words were bitten off. "But it wouldn't undo what he did. And he wasn't worth the bullet."

Her eyes searched my face. "I've never seen you like that before. I thought you were going to break his neck." She licked her lips nervously and I noticed her pupils were blowing wider. My god, was she aroused by the thought of me doing that for her?

"I...No one touches you without your permission. He broke that rule. I wasn't going to let him get away with it. I will never let anyone get away with something like that where you're concerned." I leant down and put a small kiss on her cheek, then whispered in her ear. " Anyone, _anyone in the world_ , who harms a hair on your head answers to me." She shivered again and pressed into me.

"Arthur," she said breathlessly, "Can you do something for me?" I ran a light touch over her bare shoulders before I answered.  
"Anything you want." She arched her head back so I could dust her throat with kisses.  
"Fuck me. Fuck him off me and out of me." Her voice sounded raw as she grabbed my shoulders hard enough to leave ten small bruises.

"Are you..."

"I'm not made of glass!" Her eyes flamed as I looked up at her. "I want you to fuck me. I want to own you. I want you to screw me into the mattress so hard that neither of us is in any doubt who we want to be with." She wrenched the towel off her body and I could see she'd scrubbed her abdomen as hard as her face, an angry scarlet blotch covering her fine skin from her navel to her breasts. I winced unconsciously. "What did you do to yourself?" I tentatively put my finger tips on the hot skin. "God, Ariadne. He wasn't worth this." She was silent as I brushed the raw spot, her chest heaving from her erratic breathing.

"I'll do anything you want, you know that. But let me do something about this first." She opened her mouth to protest, but I cut her off. "Lie down and stop arguing."

I found some aloe in the bathroom cabinet, and when I came back to the bedroom she was on her back, her hair drying on the pillows and her face hovering somewhere between tension and tears, making me want to punch Folds all over again. This was his fault, his doing, and now we were stuck in the aftershocks. But I couldn't, I would not, take it out on her. So I kept my voice neutral when I spoke.  "It's cold, so you're going to feel this." I sat down next to her and as carefully as I could I started to rub the gel across her stomach, paying attention to her slight jumps and inhales of breath when I hit a particularly broken patch or other. "Never do this again, do you hear me? Never. I know you don't need me to protect you, but I want to. Let me."

I put more aloe on my hand, turned her face and smoothed it over her abraded cheek. "I can take care of myself." She said quietly.

"You can. But I am here and I want you to know that. You are the one thing..." My throat closed when she looked at me, her need and anger so raw I couldn't finish.

No one warns you that love is fierce. That love is the killing rage as well as the gentle caress. I saw it in her then, that for as much as I would have spilt blood for her she would, she could, do the same for me, tearing through the world like a chainsaw. That she loved me with a fury that made me breathless, and for all that she knew I cared about her she hadn't fully realised until now that I felt the same thing for her.

She reached up and wound her arms around my neck, pulling me down possessively, so my lips were a fraction of an inch from hers.  "Arthur," she said firmly, her voice stronger than it had been all evening, " _ **Fuck. Me. Now.**_ " 

Her mouth closed over mine, prying my lips open with her tongue and curling around mine. I wanted to resist her, but seeing all the fierce need and desire burning in her had ignited something in me that I was finding myself unable to fight. She arched against me, her nipples hard points pressing into my skin as she devoured me and I answered her with everything I had, my hands grabbing her breasts and massaging them roughly until she broke away from me in a pained little moan.

"God, I love that sound." I managed before I replaced one hand with my mouth, sucking down on the cherry red nub as she writhed against me, moaning over and over as I worked her. Her fingernails scratched down my chest, fumbling towards my cock and squealing impatiently when she couldn't reach me. "I want to touch you." She bit the words off then moaned again as I took more of her breast into my mouth, my tongue desperate on her tender flesh. "In a minute." I garbled the words as I switched to her other breast, feeling the wetness she was rubbing into my stomach and pressing one hand against her there, there until she was thrusting into me like a woman possessed.

"I want, I want, I want..." She panted furiously, then bucked under me, throwing us both over so I was underneath her and she was sprawled over me, leaving me cursing her training regime for having made her strong enough to do so. Her hand immediately closed over my cock, pumping me in her warm little fist as she wriggled downwards, opened her mouth and...

"Oh fuck, Ariadne." My head arched back as she sucked me down, her free hand scratching over the dark hair at my groin, tightening into it as she went down on me, licking and pulsing her lips around me, taunting the tiny spot just under the head of my cock that made me want to lose it in her until I was yelling the apartment down. She shifted her grip, working me into full hardness as I groaned and pleaded with her. "I love that sound." She growled up at me, her eyes dark, her hair falling over her face making her look feral, a wild thing that was going to devour me whole. She shifted , crawling over me so her skin was gliding over mine and I could feel the sheen of sweat on her as she moved. "Now, Arthur." She rasped. "Fuck me now!"

My hand fumbled desperately towards the night stand drawer, but she grabbed hold and brought it back to her hip, sitting up so my erection was lying right in front of her, glistening wet with precome and her saliva. "No. Bare." She demanded. "I want to feel you come inside me."

"Ariadne, we can't. You might..." She took me in her hand again, pumped me twice, then spread her thighs and sank over me, my brain fusing at the tight, hot wetness of her pussy. Ariadne paused for a second, biting her lip, her body adjusting to fit around me, something that always made me desperately aroused. I had once promised her she would never need to fit anyone but me, and knowing that she still needed a minute to do so, that I was filling her so completely she had to wait a little before she could move, always awakened some base, carnal impulse. 

She sighed, rocked her hips back and started to ride me in earnest. "I don't care." She murmured, leaning over me as she pounded her hips against me, my hands on her back and hers braced around my shoulders. "I want you to." Her eyes bored into mine. "Fuck me, Arthur." She demanded, as I raised my lower body and started to thrust into her from underneath as she started to moan and growl again, tightening around me as if she could keep me inside her forever. "Fuck me," She gasped, "Fuck me, fuck me, fuck me," I swore, grabbed one of her breasts which was bouncing in time to her thrusts and pinched the nipple, making her face contort with pleasure, her mouth falling open and her eyes screwing shut. "Touch yourself." I ordered roughly, and one hand moved between us, circling her clit in tight, rapid strokes. "Talk to me. Tell me what you want." My voice was grating as I moved in her, the joy of her body over mine making me desperate.

"Fuck me," She repeated. "Come inside me. Mark me. Make me..." Her head lolled back as one thrust drove deeper.  
"Make you what?" I slammed up into her so hard she shook. "Make you what, Ariadne? Make you what?"  
"Make me come." Her voice was a barely intelligable gasp. "Make me come. Come inside me. Make me pregnant, Arthur, fuck me so hard you make me..." She drove down with an another animal sound "...pregnant."

I shouldn't have found that arousing. I shouldn't. We'd barely discussed it, for God's sake, other than admitting at some stage we would like to be parents, but I had never thought that the idea of...knocking Ariadne up, to be base about it, would make me even hornier than I was already. Somewhere inside me, some primal part of my brain clicked on and screamed "Do it! Make her yours! Mark her! Possess her!" It made me grab hold of her, roll us over like she had to me so her legs splayed then locked around my ass and pound into her like a man possessed.

"You want that?" My hair fell in my face, I was hot with sweat and exertion. "You want that? Say it again!" She powered into me, the bed heaving like a boat in a storm. " ** _Make. Me. Pregnant._** " Her teeth were bared as she spat the words back. "Fuck me! Come inside me! Do me until I can't walk straight!" Her body arched up, her mouth seared across mine, I was groaning and cursing. "Do it, Arthur." One hand fastened around my neck, the other was over her clit, she was moaning again as my thrusts got more erratic, my body hurtling into an orgasm so hard I thought it would make me black out, my heart hammering in my chest, my lungs tight as she arched into me, squeezing me so tight I yelled her name, spilling my seed inside her in a hot flood.

\---

"Do me until I can't walk straight?" I had her wrapped around me, warm, sticky and satisfied. Her hair tickled the end of my nose as she tucked her head into the crook of my neck.  
"I got carried away." She admitted quietly, her hands smoothing over my chest. "Sorry." I kissed the crown of her head.  
"It was what you needed. Don't apologise."

Her grip on me tightened. "The whole pregnant thing, I..."  
"It's OK. You're still on the pill, and it's not as if we couldn't manage if you were to..."  
"...have a baby." Her lips met my neck then she propped herself up on her elbows. "What I meant is, I don't know where it came from. I just wanted..." She tailed off and frowned at me.

"I'm not going anywhere, Ariadne. And you don't need to have my baby to tell the world you're with me and no one else." I reached out and cradled her head in my hands. "Although..." I smiled at her, " any baby of yours is going to wrap everyone around it's little finger, if not for the way it looks then the way it charms, outsmarts or just plain bulldozes them." 

She rolled her eyes. "As if any child of yours would be any different, Arthur." She leant over and kissed me fondly. "I can see it now, a mini you with it's crayons organised by color and neatly folded onesies in it's dresser, telling me it wants it's milk at precisely one hundred and one degrees and making you read aloud from Newton's treatise on optics before bed." 

I snorted with laughter and she managed to smile back. 

"Look," I managed carefully, "When's your week off again?"

"Next week." She drew an idle spiral over my chest.

"I'll go out tomorrow and I'll get a test, just in case."

"So, even your sperm are goal focused now?" I sat up and looked at her properly.

"No, it's a precaution. And some candy bars," I added as an afterthought, making her swat me on the arm. "No hitting in bed." I admonished.

"Damn you and your observant ways." She huffed, pointing an accusatory finger at me. "If I'm pregnant it's going to be a hell of a lot more than buying candy bars for you."

"If you're pregnant, and the key word here is _if_ , " I took hold of her, "I am going to buy you candy. I am going to rub your back. I'm even going to read every damn baby book Mal ever forced on Dom until his face went white and he did that look he does when Eames mentions going out for a team drinking night." I kissed her and let her curl into me again. "I'm going to buy baby clothes. I'm going to build a crib. I'm going to drive you nuts making you take vitamins and do breathing exercises. I'm going to let you complain you've got fat feet and I'm going to hold your hair back when you throw up in the mornings. I'm going to..."

"OK, OK. I get it. I never knew you were so damn romantic. " She chuckled sleepily. "And if I'm not?"

"I can wait." I lay down, pulling her with me and dragging the comforter over us both. "After all, you're my woman and I'm not letting you go anywhere."

"Damn right." She yawned and I felt her warm breaths, her drowsy smile, on my shoulder as she replied. "And neither are you."

  
~*~

**Author's Note:**

> A/N's _-Get Your Hands Off My Woman_ (copyright to J.Hawkins/D.Hawkins/E.Graham/F.Poullain, Warner Music/ Atlantic Records 2002) is ~~a delicate lute and viol ballad asking an over eager suitor to step away from the protagonist's lady friend~~ a frantic bit of falsetto metal glam rock involving various colourful insults to a handsy pervert after the singer's female companion.(The lyrics are reproduced without the intention of breaching copyright and no money is being made from their use.) You can hear it (should you want to) [here](http://www.youtube.com/watch?v=0V5VTER4Tgs).
> 
> The name of the client is an amalgam of the two singers who've performed this song, Justin (Hawkins, of The Darkness) and (Ben) Folds. His character is based on a mixture of Dov Charney, CEO of American Apparel, and Mark Zuckerberg, the creator of Facebook.
> 
> In the UK the expression _knob_ means _dick._  
> 


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